I recently talked to someone who used to work customer service for them. He said the company would send people the wrong stuff and ignore customer emails (ones that had concerns). He also discussed having people tell him they wouldn’t go with Diamond if they had other choices.
As a retailer myself, I find it extremely funny that he states "Lunar has terrible workers and can't handle even one more publisher" but yet this week what are the only comics that showed up AT ALL? Yup, you guessed it. DIAM.....no....LUNAR. Smh Lunar is BY FAR the best distributor we have available. Penguin isn't bad by any stretch and typically they do arrive on time. However Lunar is the only company that consistently is not only on time but typically arrives nearly a week early. It is rare to receive damaged books (it happens with every company) but if you do have an issue they are by far the easiest to deal with when it comes to replacements. They're also the only company that bags and boards incentives and "One Per Store Variants" and they typically place them in the box in a location to keep them safest. They double box EVERY package with added bubble wrap/air bubbles for protection. This guy is an idiot and clearly just trying to shit on the competition because he's a toddler who had his sucker taken away. DC leaving to Lunar is probably the best thing to happen to comics as a whole in the last decade. We haven't received more than 2 diamond orders in the last 2 maybe 3 months? Despite having customers expecting books every single week. It's a complete joke and it's going to take an insane amount of effort and intelligence to come in and turn that company around. I hope it can happen but I have very little faith.
I remember how Diamond killed other distributors, including their biggest rival, Advanced Comics. By getting DC and other publishers to an exclusive deal they put Advanced out of business. Diamond grabbed so many that Advanced could only counter with manga and some of the smaller popular publishers. Sure, TODAY Advanced would have cleaned up on manga but back then they went out of business and Diamond was just short of a monopoly. Going to a smaller store at the time that only got comics to meet the quota for the sports cards they were selling, they were shorted and screwed over many times, and I missed issues as a result. This also happened when that store closed and I resumed my comic collecting with a bigger store, but not be enough for Diamond to care, a problem I never had with Advanced Comics. It's long overdue karma if you ask me.
Lets be honest about what Chapter 11 means. It means Diamond is attempting a reorganization of finances and debts. It does not mean they are gone and liquidating... yet. But it means the "Unsecured Creditors" are fucked. All those independent publishers that Diamond was still the distributor for? They're not getting paid for sales from whenever was the last time Diamond cut them a check. If they are lucky and encounter a nice Judge, they might get any of their unsold product back from Diamond's warehouses, some day. The Local Comic Shops that have paid for next week or next months books? They have no guarantee what, if anything, will arrive? I'm not even sure how a chargeback on their Credit Cards for those orders would work in Chapter 11? And speaking of Credit, it means Diamond has none. Unless they've cut some special bankruptcy financing deal. Vendors for anything will want Cash on the Dock. Which will hamstring their ability to operate. I hope nobody had preorders out on those Diamond Select figs? Hopefully nobody paid up front. This is not the huge bomb that it would have been to the industry 2 years ago. Marvel and DC saw teh writing on the wall and got out from under Steve Geppi. And some of Diamond's side hustles still have value and will survive or be bought by someone to operate. Overstreet. the Comics Grading Services. Uncle Todd may put a bid in on the Toy Stuff? Hopefully most LCS's are now well used to getting product from places other than Diamond. And most smaller Indie publishers are going D2C or crowdfunded. And yes companies can come out of Chapter 11 better and stronger. But lets be honest. Diamond isn't one of those. Diamond was a Federal Court Approved Industry Monopol, a litteral comics cartel. And it failed under the smallest amount of strain day 1. Remember Covid? Diamond has some valuable assets. Those will hopefully survive. The comics distribution? Not so much.
Yeah, but it doesn't change their business model, practices, or how few vendors they actually have left. Diamond provides nothing of value and holds nothing of value. It's not a question of if, but when. They WILL shutter.
Thank you for clearing the air on these subject i can't stand how people are already doing click baity videos and articles diamond files for bankruptcy western comics industry is died
I knew Geppi's heart wasn't into comics anymore back in the mid 90s when he closed his stores. Then a few years ago he closed his museum that had comic store a lot of people went.
They broke comics, and comics broke them. Am i correct in remembering they were a driving force in preventing digital comics from being cheaper than print? Comics being so expensive is the main reason why young people dont read them, as opposed to manga where you can devour an entire series for so cheap. Then when the teen grows up, he buys the printed manga, baubles, posters and any future work by the author. American comics gave up on this, the turning point was during covid😢
Marvel declared bankruptcy in the 90's causing them to sell off a bunch of movie rights of their most popular characters to survive. They were able to turn it around with Marvel Studios and the MCU. What does Diamond have to sell off or modernize to survive?
I hope before your empty threat of shutting the channel down comes to pass, you do a scorched earth video on all the dirt and grim you've seen in the comics industry.
Rumor: With the second pick in the 2025 NFL draft, the Cleveland Browns will select Neil Gaiman to replace Deshaun Watson at quarterback. The Browns see a lot of similarities between Gaiman and Watson.
I really appreciate this video for clarifying the issue and some of the issues leading up to this filing and what it could mean. Did stores receive privileges from Diamond based on anything like how successfully they sell product or was this just an informal, building personal relationships deal? Also, I liked how this episode was like a preview of the mythic "Perch airs all the dirty laundry" when the channel's over lol
I’m too young to have been collecting comics during the 70s implosion, but I was there all throughout the crash in the late 90s. The business got smaller, but I’m not so sure it fundamentally changed. I don’t think those running the show know how to change. It’s not even entirely their fault; as much as I agree that a digital comics market is necessary, I don’t want my print comics to go away. Hopefully I’m just in a pessimistic mood, but this time it really feels like a death spiral.
Print doesn't have to go away. Manga went all in on digital, and still sells tons of print. Though, I have always wondered about the floppy format specifically. You have one of the least resilient products (it is literally paper) that you have to keep in pristine condition (to keep the collectors happy) that you sell for $5. Which, yes, is way too much money for 22 pages of story, but when you consider how much careful handling it needs, is sort of a miracle. Surely, if we were rethinking the industry, we would choose a different format.
We all knew this was coming when Diamond shut down over COVID bullshit and DC went to Lunar. There's simply not enough merchandise volume for Diamond to eek out a living on their margin when you take away a huge chunk like that.
From what I remember, comics had a brief resurgence right after COVID, as basically everyone was spending money like crazy. It was probably enough to keep them going until now. Keep in mind that bankruptcy is a last resort, especially for private businesses with owners actively involved. There are a lot of unknowns in bankruptcy, but one of the near certainties is that Geppi will lose all ownership of Diamond. I can't imagine how bad that must feel after the business had been built up over decades.
Thanks for the clarification. I don't like Diamond. They've been too comfortably complacent. I don't see this changing, unless they change the people in charge.
I recently talked to someone who used to work customer service for them. He said the company would send people the wrong stuff and ignore customer emails (ones that had concerns). He also discussed having people tell him they wouldn’t go with Diamond if they had other choices.
As a retailer myself, I find it extremely funny that he states "Lunar has terrible workers and can't handle even one more publisher" but yet this week what are the only comics that showed up AT ALL? Yup, you guessed it. DIAM.....no....LUNAR. Smh Lunar is BY FAR the best distributor we have available. Penguin isn't bad by any stretch and typically they do arrive on time. However Lunar is the only company that consistently is not only on time but typically arrives nearly a week early. It is rare to receive damaged books (it happens with every company) but if you do have an issue they are by far the easiest to deal with when it comes to replacements. They're also the only company that bags and boards incentives and "One Per Store Variants" and they typically place them in the box in a location to keep them safest. They double box EVERY package with added bubble wrap/air bubbles for protection. This guy is an idiot and clearly just trying to shit on the competition because he's a toddler who had his sucker taken away. DC leaving to Lunar is probably the best thing to happen to comics as a whole in the last decade. We haven't received more than 2 diamond orders in the last 2 maybe 3 months? Despite having customers expecting books every single week. It's a complete joke and it's going to take an insane amount of effort and intelligence to come in and turn that company around. I hope it can happen but I have very little faith.
Have a buddy who owns a shop and lunar has been the best distributor for them. Both diamond and penguin have mess up orders.
I remember how Diamond killed other distributors, including their biggest rival, Advanced Comics. By getting DC and other publishers to an exclusive deal they put Advanced out of business. Diamond grabbed so many that Advanced could only counter with manga and some of the smaller popular publishers. Sure, TODAY Advanced would have cleaned up on manga but back then they went out of business and Diamond was just short of a monopoly. Going to a smaller store at the time that only got comics to meet the quota for the sports cards they were selling, they were shorted and screwed over many times, and I missed issues as a result. This also happened when that store closed and I resumed my comic collecting with a bigger store, but not be enough for Diamond to care, a problem I never had with Advanced Comics. It's long overdue karma if you ask me.
Lets be honest about what Chapter 11 means. It means Diamond is attempting a reorganization of finances and debts. It does not mean they are gone and liquidating... yet. But it means the "Unsecured Creditors" are fucked. All those independent publishers that Diamond was still the distributor for? They're not getting paid for sales from whenever was the last time Diamond cut them a check. If they are lucky and encounter a nice Judge, they might get any of their unsold product back from Diamond's warehouses, some day. The Local Comic Shops that have paid for next week or next months books? They have no guarantee what, if anything, will arrive? I'm not even sure how a chargeback on their Credit Cards for those orders would work in Chapter 11? And speaking of Credit, it means Diamond has none. Unless they've cut some special bankruptcy financing deal. Vendors for anything will want Cash on the Dock. Which will hamstring their ability to operate. I hope nobody had preorders out on those Diamond Select figs? Hopefully nobody paid up front. This is not the huge bomb that it would have been to the industry 2 years ago. Marvel and DC saw teh writing on the wall and got out from under Steve Geppi. And some of Diamond's side hustles still have value and will survive or be bought by someone to operate. Overstreet. the Comics Grading Services. Uncle Todd may put a bid in on the Toy Stuff? Hopefully most LCS's are now well used to getting product from places other than Diamond. And most smaller Indie publishers are going D2C or crowdfunded. And yes companies can come out of Chapter 11 better and stronger. But lets be honest. Diamond isn't one of those. Diamond was a Federal Court Approved Industry Monopol, a litteral comics cartel. And it failed under the smallest amount of strain day 1. Remember Covid? Diamond has some valuable assets. Those will hopefully survive. The comics distribution? Not so much.
Yeah, but it doesn't change their business model, practices, or how few vendors they actually have left. Diamond provides nothing of value and holds nothing of value. It's not a question of if, but when. They WILL shutter.
...it failed under the smallest amount of strain...
My argument from day 1.
Thank you for clearing the air on these subject i can't stand how people are already doing click baity videos and articles diamond files for bankruptcy western comics industry is died
I knew Geppi's heart wasn't into comics anymore back in the mid 90s when he closed his stores. Then a few years ago he closed his museum that had comic store a lot of people went.
They broke comics, and comics broke them. Am i correct in remembering they were a driving force in preventing digital comics from being cheaper than print?
Comics being so expensive is the main reason why young people dont read them, as opposed to manga where you can devour an entire series for so cheap. Then when the teen grows up, he buys the printed manga, baubles, posters and any future work by the author. American comics gave up on this, the turning point was during covid😢
Maybe Hibbs should start inviting some Random House and Lunar execs to the steakhouse?
🤔
When working at my LCS, I often thought that blind monkeys may have been able to put the diamond orders together better.
Needs to change.
how many newspapers, magazines have closed in over thirty years?
print may not be dead, but things have changed
Marvel declared bankruptcy in the 90's causing them to sell off a bunch of movie rights of their most popular characters to survive. They were able to turn it around with Marvel Studios and the MCU. What does Diamond have to sell off or modernize to survive?
Nice seeing a Pissed Perch video
I hope before your empty threat of shutting the channel down comes to pass, you do a scorched earth video on all the dirt and grim you've seen in the comics industry.
Rumor: With the second pick in the 2025 NFL draft, the Cleveland Browns will select Neil Gaiman to replace Deshaun Watson at quarterback. The Browns see a lot of similarities between Gaiman and Watson.
Out of every comics retailer in America, why does Brian Hibbs have any level of sway?
Because he writes and a scumbag prints it.
I really appreciate this video for clarifying the issue and some of the issues leading up to this filing and what it could mean.
Did stores receive privileges from Diamond based on anything like how successfully they sell product or was this just an informal, building personal relationships deal?
Also, I liked how this episode was like a preview of the mythic "Perch airs all the dirty laundry" when the channel's over lol
I wonder which indie company will be first to announce a move to Lunar/Penguin.
I say Dark Horse.
I’m too young to have been collecting comics during the 70s implosion, but I was there all throughout the crash in the late 90s. The business got smaller, but I’m not so sure it fundamentally changed. I don’t think those running the show know how to change. It’s not even entirely their fault; as much as I agree that a digital comics market is necessary, I don’t want my print comics to go away.
Hopefully I’m just in a pessimistic mood, but this time it really feels like a death spiral.
Print doesn't have to go away. Manga went all in on digital, and still sells tons of print.
Though, I have always wondered about the floppy format specifically. You have one of the least resilient products (it is literally paper) that you have to keep in pristine condition (to keep the collectors happy) that you sell for $5. Which, yes, is way too much money for 22 pages of story, but when you consider how much careful handling it needs, is sort of a miracle. Surely, if we were rethinking the industry, we would choose a different format.
We all knew this was coming when Diamond shut down over COVID bullshit and DC went to Lunar. There's simply not enough merchandise volume for Diamond to eek out a living on their margin when you take away a huge chunk like that.
We really didn’t ask for much but they decided to continue to treat the ones that brought them to the dance like a boil on their ass.
Any reason why they didn't do this coming out of Covid?
From what I remember, comics had a brief resurgence right after COVID, as basically everyone was spending money like crazy. It was probably enough to keep them going until now. Keep in mind that bankruptcy is a last resort, especially for private businesses with owners actively involved. There are a lot of unknowns in bankruptcy, but one of the near certainties is that Geppi will lose all ownership of Diamond. I can't imagine how bad that must feel after the business had been built up over decades.
I have no idea what gaiman is accused of, but he has been being kind of an ass over the last few years.. still like his books.
Arby's files for bankruptcy next?
🤔
I hope so.
And yeah, I think he did.
Is it wrong that I want to film elevator pitches for comic ideas I have and send it to you?
Was anybody really surpised by this?
No?
Thanks for the clarification. I don't like Diamond. They've been too comfortably complacent. I don't see this changing, unless they change the people in charge.
Perch posting late night? I’d have to go back to High School to get more fresh
*insert Jeremy Clarkson meme* Oh noooo. Anyway ...
When will Gaiman and Ellis start their own publishing company?
I think one isn’t like the other
@ComicsPerch that's fair, I'm just aiming at low hanging fruit.
Is Gaiman the most ironic name in comics?
This video makes me feel as though I have a greater understanding of ch 11 than ole Mr. Hibbs... I went to community college
One more question. This year, Free Comic Book Day:
A) Will not happen.
B) Will happen, but it'll be the last one.
C) Will happen.
C.
Who cares? Free comic book day is pointless when you don’t drop current material.
@@ComicBookMuscle I care, so...that.
God bless you Perch.
The woke will be dumping their Sandman comics, good time to get some deals.
Ahem, “Now what”
I'm surpised I have never asked you this Perch, but have you ever met Rumiko Takahashi?
I have.
@@ComicsPerch Cool, when did you met her?
Brian Hibbs grudge video lol
Not what?
Neil Gaiman was always overrated.
“Not what”, but why? :P
Not what
Me hitting the refresh button on TH-cam until Perch posts this video. 👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼👇🏼
I'm having a day, so a Perch distraction right now like Neil Gaiman needs a good PR agent.